Cleaning and Organizing

When you think of the idea of creating more joy in your life, what’s the first thing you think of?

Chances are, you probably didn’t think of words like “tidying” or “organizing” or “de-cluttering,” right?

Yeah, those are probably the last words that would have come to my mind, too! That’s why I was so surprised when I first heard about the concept that taking care of clutter could actually lead to creating more joy.

When I first heard about using soap nuts as a laundry detergent alternative, I liked the idea of using something that was natural and simple . . . but I was also pretty skeptical that they would actually work.

When I tried them, though, I was pleasantly surprised by how well they cleaned my clothes. They worked just as well as any homemade or store bought natural laundry detergents I had tried, only they’re even easier to use and much cheaper too.

Without a doubt, being a clutter-creator is one of my worst bad habits.

I still have some clothes stuffed in the back of my closet from 10 years ago, and even though I haven’t worn them since high school, I’ve still held on to them “just in case” I might ever need to wear them again. I have a whole forest’s worth of paper that has accumulated over the years from kindergarten through grad school, and I probably have enough books to fill half a library.

One of my least favorite cleaning chores has always been washing windows and mirrors.

Conventional glass-cleaning products are usually filled with chemicals, and they usually smell pretty nasty too.

And even natural cleaners often don’t work as well, leaving streaks on the glass – which seems to happen a lot even with those products that claim to be “streak-free.” And then there’s the problem of the little bits of lint left by the paper towels that make the glass look just as dusty as if it had never been cleaned in the first place.